1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a supplemental side impact protection system for an automotive vehicle.
2. Disclosure Information
The presence of bumpers at the opposite ends of conventional passenger vehicles, coupled with the considerable crush space afforded by an engine compartment, generally located in the front of a vehicle, and a luggage compartment, generally located in the rear, have greatly facilitated the energy management required during impact events directed to the front and rear portions of conventional vehicles. At the sides of most vehicles, however, the crush distances are much less than those typically available for the front and rear of the vehicle. Moreover, the doors and rocker panels of most vehicles do not readily lend themselves to incorporation of the structures typically used for energy management in the front and rear bumpers of such vehicles.
The present invention provides supplemental side impact protection by means of a deployable energy management structure which is deployed by an electronic system controller according to a predetermined logic sequence. Although it is known in the art to have nerf bars which are raised manually to protect the sides of a vehicle, such bars are neither automatically deployed, nor, for that matter, are they deployable in real time in response to an assessment performed in real time either prior to, or during an impact. The present system solves problems associated with prior art deployable side safety beams by providing an external energy management structure which is deployable according to the results of a risk assessment performed by an onboard controller.